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Search building permits

GET/permit

Parameters

ParameterTypeDescription
municipalitystringoptionalFilter to one city by its slug, e.g. 'new_westminster', 'toronto', 'north_vancouver_city'.Exact match. The dataset's /coverage endpoint lists the valid slugs. 'city' is accepted as an alias.
qstringoptionalFull-text search across the indexed fields of the record, e.g. q=roofing or q="Iron Hill".Matches business, contractor and project names, the address, the city and the permit or licence number, on every plan including free. It does not match a person's name: these datasets carry business records only. Space-separated words require all terms ("deck addition"). Use OR to match any term ("pool OR spa"), quotes for an exact phrase ("secondary suite"), and a leading minus to exclude ("renovation -interior").
permit_typestringoptionalFilter by normalized permit type (exact match): new_construction, renovation, addition, demolition, change_of_use, other.Matches the permit_type_canonical field, not the raw per-city permit_type string.
tradestringoptionalFilter trade sub-permits by trade (exact match): electrical, plumbing, mechanical, gas, sprinkler, sign, trade_other.A trade permit is pulled for work on one system rather than the building, so this is the field for replacement-cycle work: a furnace swap is trade=mechanical, a rewire is trade=electrical. Only cities that publish trade permits separately carry it; combine with permit_type, which every permit has.
contractorstringoptionalFilter permits by the firm that pulled them.A whole name is matched exactly against the normalized contractor name and is indexed; a fragment falls back to a substring across the contractor, company and builder fields. Cities file the same firm under several spellings, so the normalized form is the one that groups them.
units_minintegeroptionalPermits with at least this many dwelling units.Reads whichever of units, dwelling_units, total_units or units_created the city publishes.
floor_area_minnumberoptionalPermits with at least this much floor area, in square metres.Reads floor_area or area_m2, whichever the city publishes. Cities that publish square feet are not converted and are not matched.
storeys_minintegeroptionalPermits on a building of at least this many storeys.
structure_typestringoptionalFilter by structure or building type as the city publishes it (exact, case-insensitive), e.g. 'Single Family Dwelling', 'Hotel'.Call /permit/stats for the values in use.
neighbourhoodstringoptionalFilter by neighbourhood (partial match).Matches whichever of neighborhood, neighbourhood or community the city publishes; Calgary calls it community.
wardstringoptionalFilter by electoral ward as the city publishes it (exact, case-insensitive).
zoningstringoptionalFilter by the zoning code on the record (partial match), e.g. 'R-1'.Present on permits, development permits and assessments.
statusstringoptionalPermits: the normalized status (issued, in_review, completed, expired, cancelled, unknown), same as status_canonical.Major projects: proposed, under_construction, complete, on_hold, cancelled. Business licences: the status the city publishes, e.g. APPROVED, case-insensitive. Other datasets: the status as the city publishes it.
status_canonicalstringoptionalNormalized permit status: issued, in_review, completed, expired, cancelled, unknown
citystringoptionalAlias for municipality.
value_minnumberoptionalMinimum value: construction_value for permits, assessed_value for assessments, estimated_cost for major projects.
value_maxnumberoptionalMaximum value, on the same field as value_min.
issued_afterstringoptionalFilter by date >= YYYY-MM-DD (issued_date).Aliases: date_from, date_after
issued_beforestringoptionalFilter by date <= YYYY-MM-DD.Aliases: date_to, date_before
latnumberoptionalLatitude for proximity search.Send with lng.
lngnumberoptionalLongitude for proximity search.Send with lat.
radius_kmnumberoptionalRadius in km, 0.1 to 25.Optional: lat and lng with no radius search 1 km around the point. The radius actually applied is returned as radius_km in the response, so a default is never silent. For every record at one street address rather than everything near it, use /property.
sort_bystringoptionalSort field: date (the record's own date, e.g. issued_date for permits) or value (the field value_min reads).
sort_orderstringoptionalSort order: asc or desc
limitintegeroptionalRecords per page, 1 to 500.Free-tier keys are capped lower; the cap applied is the `count` in the response.
offsetintegeroptionalRecords to skip. Fine for jumping to a known page;use `cursor` to walk a whole result set, because offset re-reads everything it skips and shifts when new records arrive.
cursorstringoptionalPagination cursor from next_cursor in a previous response.Use instead of offset for deep pagination.

Request

curl --request GET \
  --url 'https://api.builddata.ca/permit' \
  --header 'X-API-Key: YOUR_API_KEY'
import requests

url = "https://api.builddata.ca/permit"
headers = {"X-API-Key": "YOUR_API_KEY"}
resp = requests.get(url, headers=headers)
print(resp.json())
const res = await fetch("https://api.builddata.ca/permit", {
  headers: {
    "X-API-Key": "YOUR_API_KEY",
  },
});
const data = await res.json();
console.log(data);
<?php
$ch = curl_init("https://api.builddata.ca/permit");
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER, true);
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_HTTPHEADER, [
    "X-API-Key: YOUR_API_KEY",
]);
echo curl_exec($ch);
require "net/http"
require "uri"

uri = URI("https://api.builddata.ca/permit")
req = Net::HTTP::Get.new(uri)
req["X-API-Key"] = "YOUR_API_KEY"
res = Net::HTTP.start(uri.hostname, uri.port, use_ssl: true) { |h| h.request(req) }
puts res.body
package main

import (
    "fmt"
    "io"
    "net/http"
)

func main() {
    req, _ := http.NewRequest("GET", "https://api.builddata.ca/permit", nil)
    req.Header.Add("X-API-Key", "YOUR_API_KEY")
    res, _ := http.DefaultClient.Do(req)
    defer res.Body.Close()
    body, _ := io.ReadAll(res.Body)
    fmt.Println(string(body))
}
import java.net.URI;
import java.net.http.*;

HttpRequest req = HttpRequest.newBuilder()
    .uri(URI.create("https://api.builddata.ca/permit"))
    .header("X-API-Key", "YOUR_API_KEY")
    .build();
HttpResponse<String> res = HttpClient.newHttpClient()
    .send(req, HttpResponse.BodyHandlers.ofString());
System.out.println(res.body());

Example response

{
  "entity_type": "permit",
  "count": 1,
  "offset": 0,
  "results": [
    {
      "record_id": "24 223023 PLB:00",
      "municipality": "toronto",
      "lat": 43.65401,
      "lng": -79.42376,
      "work": "Building Permit Related(PS)",
      "status": "Permit Issued",
      "address": "865 COLLEGE ST",
      "description": "Plumbing - INTERIOR ALTERNATION OF 3RD FLOOR SUITE",
      "issued_date": "2025-01-29",
      "permit_type": "Plumbing(PS)",
      "application_date": "2024-10-07",
      "construction_value": null
    }
  ]
}

Response fields

One permit record. Measured over 6,000 live records sampled across municipalities. Percentages say how often each field is populated: sources publish different columns, so a field missing from a given record is normal rather than an error.

FieldTypeDescription
addressstringAlways present.
application_datestringPopulated in 49% of sampled records.
area_m2numberPopulated in 11% of sampled records.
building_typestringPopulated in 21% of sampled records.
companystringPopulated in 21% of sampled records.
construction_valuenumberPopulated in 55% of sampled records.
contractorstringPopulated in 15% of sampled records.
contractor_namestringPopulated in 22% of sampled records.
contractor_name_normalizedstringPopulated in 24% of sampled records.
current_usestringPopulated in 13% of sampled records.
descriptionstringPopulated in 49% of sampled records.
dwelling_units_createdstringPopulated in 14% of sampled records.
fetched_atstringWhen Nimbus last ingested this record. Bookkeeping, not source data. Always present.
geocode_failedbooleanPopulated in 36% of sampled records.
issued_datestringPopulated in 96% of sampled records.
latstringPopulated in 75% of sampled records.
lngstringPopulated in 75% of sampled records.
municipalitystringCity slug. Call /{entity_type}/coverage for every slug in this dataset. Always present.
neighborhoodstringPopulated in 17% of sampled records.
neighbourhoodstringPopulated in 26% of sampled records.
normalized_addressstringAddress normalized for joining the same property across datasets. Always present.
normalized_business_namestringBusiness name normalized for joining the same business across datasets. Populated in 22% of sampled records.
opening_soonbooleanPopulated in 82% of sampled records.
permit_numberstringPopulated in 97% of sampled records.
permit_typestringPopulated in 91% of sampled records.
permit_type_canonicalstringPermit type mapped onto a shared vocabulary. This is what the permit_type filter matches. Always present.
postal_codestringPopulated in 27% of sampled records.
provincestringPopulated in 90% of sampled records.
record_idstringStable identifier for this record. Pass it to the /{entity_type}/{record_id} endpoint. Always present.
statusstringPopulated in 90% of sampled records.
status_canonicalstringStatus mapped onto a shared vocabulary. This is what the status_canonical filter matches. Always present.
structure_typestringPopulated in 18% of sampled records.
trade_canonicalstringThe trade a sub-permit covers (electrical, plumbing, mechanical, gas, sprinkler, sign, trade_other). This is what the trade filter matches. Only cities that publish trade permits separately carry it, so it is absent in most of the country but present on every permit from those cities. Populated in 2% of sampled records.
wardstringPopulated in 13% of sampled records.
workstringPopulated in 81% of sampled records.
work_typestringPopulated in 16% of sampled records.
69 more fields published by only one or two cities

Present on under 10% of records. Useful when you are working with a specific city, not something to rely on across the dataset.

FieldTypePopulated
actual_usestring2.6%
address_detailsstring0.6%
application_numberstring3.3%
areainteger0.9%
area_ft2string0.0%
auc_groupstring3.2%
bedroomsinteger0.0%
builderstring0.0%
builder_namestring4.3%
building_categorystring3.3%
building_usestring6.7%
categorystring3.3%
citystring6.7%
communitystring6.6%
completed_datestring2.1%
construction_typestring3.3%
contact_rolestring0.7%
contractor_addressstring1.9%
contractor_phonestring0.3%
datasetstring3.3%
demolitionboolean3.3%
domainstring3.3%
dwelling_unitsinteger8.2%
dwelling_units_loststring2.6%
dwellings_createdstring1.1%
entered_datestring3.3%
est_const_cost_centsinteger3.3%
existing_gfa_m2string0.0%
expiry_datestring7.0%
file_typestring3.3%
floor_areanumber2.8%
floor_area_commercialinteger3.3%
floor_area_industrialinteger3.3%
floor_area_institutionalinteger3.3%
floor_area_residentialinteger3.3%
former_citystring3.3%
gfanumber0.3%
land_usestring3.1%
land_use_districtstring3.1%
latitudenumber3.3%
legal_descriptionstring3.3%
longitudenumber3.3%
lotsstring6.6%
matriculestring3.0%
new_floor_area_sqftnumber0.8%
parent_permit_numberstring0.8%
permit_costnumber1.5%
permit_feenumber3.1%
permit_groupstring3.3%
permit_type_codestring3.3%
permit_type_descriptionstring3.3%
pidstring3.3%
processed_datestring0.0%
proposed_gfastring0.0%
proposed_usestring3.3%
received_datestring3.3%
revisionstring3.3%
second_unitstring0.0%
storeysinteger7.0%
structurestring0.4%
subdivisionstring3.3%
subjectstring0.9%
total_unitsinteger2.2%
unitsinteger2.2%
units_createdinteger6.7%
units_lostinteger0.2%
units_net_changeinteger3.3%
work_classstring3.3%
zoningstring3.3%

Errors

Every error returns {"detail": "…"}, a sentence naming what was wrong and, where there is one, the fix.

StatusWhen
400The request is understood but cannot be served as asked, e.g. offset above 9500, or cursor combined with sort_by=value. The message names the fix.
403Missing or invalid API key.
404No such endpoint, or no record with that id.
422A parameter is invalid: an unknown city slug, an impossible date, a limit above 500, an unrecognised sort field, or a misspelled parameter name. The message names the parameter and, where there is one, the nearest valid value.
429Rate limit or plan quota exceeded.
500Unexpected server error.
504The query took too long. Narrow it with a municipality or a date range.
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